“FATE MUST FIND SOMEONE TO SPEAK THROUGH”:
CHRISTIANITY, RAGNARÖK, AND THE LOSS OF ICELANDIC INDEPENDENCE
IN THE EYES OF THE ICELANDERS AS ILLUSTRATED BY
GÍSLA SAGA SÚRSSONAR
Thesis (M.A.) University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2008Iceland surrendered political control to the Norwegian monarchy in 1262, but
immediately resented their choice. The sagas about reliance on the Norwegians, clearly
illustrating that the Icelanders knew where this path was leading them.
Gísla Saga is a particularly interesting text to examine in light of the contemporaneous political climate,
as it takes place in the years leading up to the conversion but was written between the
conversion and the submission to Norwegian rule. Though Gísla does not explicitly
comment on either the conversion or the increase in Norwegian influence, close
examination illuminates ambiguity in the portrayal of Christian and pagan characters and
a general sense of terminal foreboding.
This subtle commentary becomes clearer when one reads Gísla Saga in light of
the story of Ragnarök, the death of the gods and the end of the Norse world. Characters
and images in Gísla Saga may be compared with the events of Ragnarök, the apocalyptic
battle between the Æsir and the giants, illustrating how the Christian conversion and
Norwegian submission brought about the end of Iceland’s golden age by destroying the
last home of the Norse gods. In order to closely compare the events of Gísla Saga
with those of Ragnarök, I have chosen to work with the final battle as it is described in the
Volspá, or The Prophesy of the Seeress, one of the Elder Edda, of which I have translated
the Codex Regis and Hauksbók manuscript versions, in order to deal closely and
specifically with the text. Finally I discuss images of Ragnarök, as it is told in the
Voluspá, which appear in Gísla, drawing close the ties between Christianization and
Norwegian rule and the ways in which Icelanders recognized this conversion as the end
of their world
